


Journey

by Morgyn Leri (morgynleri)



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: GFY, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-09-20
Updated: 2010-09-20
Packaged: 2017-10-12 01:33:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,211
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/119319
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/morgynleri/pseuds/Morgyn%20Leri
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"We're all alone, in the end." The soft voice draws his attention to a shadowed figure in an archway. "Facing that final darkness, that last journey. There is no one there to help us, only our own fear and our own strength."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Journey

**Night**   
_There are visions, there are memories  
There are echoes of thundering hooves_

His eyes are pale, cloudy with cateracts, staring blindly out into the darkness of the room. A darkness that comforts the two who care for him, blinded by the light of day as much as he had been blinded by a horror of which he rarely spoke.

"I wish to speak with the Seer." The few who come to this little room hidden in the city's warren of alleys always ask for the same thing. To speak to the man who can see beyond the here and now, into a person's soul, into their fate.

"There is no Seer here. Nothing but an old man and his children." Their response is likewise measured and memorized. It is a rare moment indeed that they would be wrong, and so they keep to their routine, and protect him as much as care for him.

Some nights, when the city is quiet around them, and the stars shine brightly in the sky, the man speaks to them, telling them of what he sees. Of spinning planets far away, of people who look nothing like those around them, of creatures and plants they never see except through his words.

"Burning. The sky is burning, the people are dying. Death coming to those who never lived, a planet destroyed that never was."

The nights when he speaks of the planet that never was are the ones they fear. He shivers, and rocks, and mourns for those he speaks of. For a people who are gone, and at the same time, have never been. And in the morning, when light filters dimly into his room, that horror has laid another mark upon him, scars he will bear until his death.

_There are fires, there is laughter  
There's the sound of a thousand voices_

All around him, he can hear the sound of life, the chatter and buzz of a city. There, a house spilling light and people out into the street, strains of music and celebration accompanying them. A naming day for a new child, from what he can hear of the words. He walks a little faster, shoving the memories that it brings up away.

The street beyond is quieter, the neighbors all at the party. No one will try to sleep with free food and company on offer. Company. He takes the next side street, trying to lose himself as much as he can, for a few hours. There is no company for him, not like these people enjoy. Never again. No one left to truly understand.

That he should have died with everyone else crosses his mind, and he presses one hand against a mud-brick wall for a moment, leaning his weight on that one point. He'd fled, and he'd lived. He couldn't go back, has to live like this, alone, the last of his kind.

"We're all alone, in the end." The soft voice draws his attention to a shadowed figure in an archway. "Facing that final darkness, that last journey. There is no one there to help us, only our own fear and our own strength."

"Not like this." The Doctor pulls away from the wall, a small frown on his face as he tries to study the person in the dark. In the shadows that are clinging like garments or a second skin to... it.

The figure shifts, a head turning towards him. "Always like this. Some sooner than others, but in the end, all come to this."

"Who are you?"

"A being alone, you could say. Facing that final journey. Afraid, but not of the dark."

**Moon**   
_In the velvet of the darkness  
By the silhouette of silent trees_

The two moons overhead pool soft-edged shadows at the Doctor's feet as he steps out onto the roof. The person who's led the way here sits next to the wall at the edge, face turned towards the Doctor, hidden by the deep shadows that cling to it.

"The whole city can be seen from here, Doctor." The figure raises a hand, gesturing out over the wall it leans against. "In all its primitive splendor. People living, loving, dying. All of them alone, surrounded by family."

"You said that already." The Doctor crosses his arms, a scowl creasing his face for a moment.

"I know. But you didn't listen." A hint of dissapointment creeps into the voice. "You're very good at that, not listening to others. You too often think that they're lacking in one fashion or another."

The Doctor opens his mouth to reply, and then closes it again, his brow furrowing in thought. "You know more than you should."

A sigh from the shadowy figure, and it shifts, standing, its back to the Doctor. "I know what I need to know, nothing more, and nothing less. I know that the dark isn't as fearful as the light of a burning world. I know that you grieve for sending so many on that final journey, when you didn't have the courage to stay and face it yourself."

The Doctor freezes at the words, fury and fear mingling, his hearts beating faster with the surge of adreneline the emotions bring on. "How?" He knows where he is, knows when he is, knows that these people don't have the means to know what this being does.

"What I am, what I see, all I know." A shrug of the shoulders. "I'm not supposed to exist. But neither are you. Myth and mistake, you and I."

_They are watching, they are waiting  
They are witnessing life's mysteries_

The sounds of the city have faded slightly, those who live here asleep in their tiny rooms, or never returning, huddled in a pile in an alley elsewhere for the cleaners to find in the morning. Only one place harbors movement, two figures leaning close as they whisper, watching another who doesn't move.

They worry that he's dying, and they preen brittle feathers that rest against the thin skin of his scalp, trace scars across fragile skin around eyes that do not see, and a mouth that is silent tonight. Warm still, and the steady beat of a heart old before it was young, breaths puffing across skin younger than that which had seen fewer years.

"He merely sleeps." The brother stubbornly clings to the hope that the frail figure will wake up, and stay with them another day. He carefully shifts the man so he will be more comfortable in his sleep. "He is tired."

"He will not wake up. He is dying." The sister looks older than her years for a moment, dark eyes resting on the face that should look younger than her own, and yet looks so old. "He is beyond us, and will not return."

"You can't know that. You're not like him." Brother sits back on his heels, watching the man helplessly, sorrow flattening feathers like rain.

Sister says nothing, watching the man in his bed, the man who will not wake again. She does not need to be like the one dying to know that she is watching the beginning of a journey she still fears to take.

**Sun**   
_Cascading stars on the slumbering hills  
They are dancing as far as the sea_

The sun rises over the city, stars fading over the hills that reflect blue hues back to the golden brick-work buildings. Sister raises her arms to the fading stars, a silent plea in her stance. Take them all away from this city, the pleading crowds they have endured since the Seer first spoke.

She knows there is something wrong with the Seer, that she and Brother take care of so carefully. She is not like him, to know the future before it happens, but she knows that the body cannot see so much, endure so much, and be whole. She knows that those who beg the Seer to see their fate hasten his own.

"There can be no Seer here," she whispers as she flees the sun's burn, wide eyes meeting Brother's gaze. "He burns more with each, he dies more with every word. There can be no more Seer. Nothing but a man and his nest-mates."

"No one will believe us here. They know he sees what happens before it can come." Brother puffs out his feathers, peering out at the street where the first people are beginning to gather, to beg to learn their fate, though the Seer speaks in riddles they do not understand.

"Then we leave when the sun is gone, and they are huddled in their nests." Sister hisses at the door, scaring back one brave chick that creeps too close. "Take him where he does not have to see the visions that burn like the sun."

"Where shall we go?" Brother is younger than Sister, hesitant of leaving the nest, leaving what he knows.

"There are ships that sail the stars, that leave from the city on the sea. Another place, with nights longer, and everyone is strange, and asks no questions about what may be." Sister is confident this is what they must do. Certain that it will stop the visions that burn her youngest nest-mate's mind and body.

_Riding o'er land, you can feel its gentle hand  
Leading on to its destiny_

All around him is a hum that is familiar and unfamiliar, heard all his life, but never until this moment. Before him is a strange glow that he knows burns his life away, slowly and so fast. And a world, like nothing he's seen before. A world that does not exist as it burns and dies.

He sees moonlight over rooftops, strange metallic creatures, a man pulling a girl into a run, golden light bursting forth to free one man from inside another. Hears screams of pain, a grating word he does not understand but knows to fear, brave words spoken with a certainty that they won't be enough. It all mingles and jumbles, and the burn fades when it does, the hum and glow less than the memories not his own, not anyone's anymore.

"Mistake?" That word he understands, and he's drawn back to the present. Present, past, future, it's all the same. "How?"

"You said it yourself." The Seer focuses on the city before him, like and unlike the one in which he was born. "What I know, I should not." He raises one clawed hand to tap his temple, a gesture learned from the memories not his own. "All jumbled in here. The past is future is present is past. Happened and not happened, people that never existed as they died."

The Doctor shifts behind him, and he feels the man's glare against the shadows and robes that cling to him. He's not listening to the riddle, not yet.

"You do not listen. Everyone alone together, past is future is present is past, what happens does not happen." He clacks his jaw in frustration. "The world that never was burns, and the storm runs away. Everyone alone together, you have to listen to understand."

"You're making less sense than most prophets." The Doctor sounds more irritated than he did earlier, and the Seer lets out a hiss of frustration, finally turning to look at him.

"Listen, understand. All of us, always, alone, together." He saw the confusion spread across the man's face when the Doctor tried to meet his eyes. Difficult when they could not be seen through the shadows that stubbornly clung to him. Would cling to him until he could let himself go. "Travel, the past is future is present is past."

**Day**   
_Take me with you on this journey  
Where the boundaries of time are now tossed_

The city around them wakes with the soft patter of children's feet as they head for the temple school, and the more measured tread of women going to the fountains for water. The sun is barely above the horizon, a deep red ball slowly climbing into the sky, casting long shadows that merge with the ones that hide the being he's been talking to.

He thinks he may, perhaps, have figured out part of the riddle, but not all of it. The being still lets out frustrated sighs and strangled noises that shouldn't come from a humanoid throat. Not that he can tell what the being is, the shadows unbroken by the light of day.

"You see more than most, but you don't see everything. All at a distance, but never beside you, behind you."

"Something new now." The Doctor ran a hand over his hair before crossing his arms. "Alone together I can understand, you're talking about my companions, aren't you?"

"You hear but don't listen. See, but don't look. To understand you have to listen, to look." A hiss of frustration. "The inside-out box, sun inside the box painted like the sky. Past is future is present is past. Inside-out, upside-down, twisted around."

"Time isn't linear." The Doctor blinked, frowning. "You don't have the words for what you're seeing."

A trill of amusement comes from the being. "Past is present is future is past, you listened!"

"Time, and what?" The Doctor is frustrated. The box, that has to be the TARDIS, but why describe it as inside-out? "The TARDIS has her insides all inside."

"Inside-out, outside-in, present-future-past fire that burns inside-out, shadows make the light. Change and the same, all alone together, afraid of the light that burns inside-out." A clack of its jaw, or perhaps a beak. "Listen-remember, memories are forgotten and not yet. Listen-understand, past is future is present is past."

"Something that will happen." The Doctor sighs, crossing his arms over his chest once more as he looks at the shadow-clad creature. "It's a riddle because you don't have the words, and I'm not going to figure it out until it happens, is that it?"

"Listens-remembers, alone always, all of us together. Memories are, are not, not yet." It brings clawed hands up to wrap around its head. "Burning, its burning inside-out, no new face to show underneath, it all burns away. You must listen, must remember, must understand. I cannot stay, the shadows make the light, and the light burns, and the inside-out box sings."

_In cathedrals of the forest  
In the words of the tongues now lost_

Sister looks up when a shadow darkens the doorway, a clack of her jaw drawing Brother's attention as well. The man studies them for a moment before stepping inside, his shoulders hunching forward beneath the leather jacket he wore.

"Heard there's a Seer here." He sounds indifferent, though under it, there's a tension in his voice, and Sister's crest rises with the first stirrings of fear.

"You heard wrong," she tells him, keeping between him and her brothers. "There is only an old man and his children." The familiar words taste strangely foul in her mouth, as if the lie is harder to tell now that he is fading away.

"Can't be old." The man frowns. "Might not be a seer, but he sees more than he should be able to." His eyes flicker towards the room she and Brother are protecting.

"Why then do you ask for a Seer?"

"Can't ask for a ghost." A hint of irritation in his voice gives the tension underneath the bland exterior a chance to show through.

"He's not dead yet." Brother's voice is strained behind her.

"Dying."

Sister hisses, drawing the man's attention back towards her. "You ask for one who is dying, and tell us nothing of why."

"Thought I'd take him to what he keeps seeing. Part of it, anyway." The man shrugs.

"He will not wake up, only die. What use is taking him from his home, his family?" Sister fluffs her feathers with another warning hiss.

The man stays silent for a moment, the tension vibrating through the room and its occupants until he speaks again, his voice quieter now.

"He'll rest quiet there."

"Where?"

"Doesn't he ever say anything to you?" the man snaps, glaring at her, lashing out from the pain she can almost see beneath the question.

"The world that never was." Brother repeats the words the Seer has used night after night, caught in the grip of his curse.

Sister shivers, her feathers slicking down against her skin.

**Home**   
_Find the answers, ask the questions_

Sister turns her head up to look at the star-studded sky, an eerie ululation rising into the night. She wonders for a moment which pin-prick of light is the star which once gave life to the Doctor's planet. Which one had haunted the Seer's dreams until he died.

The forest around her is silent when she is done her mourning cry. Soon the sun will rise again, and she'll have to return to the city and the rooms she had shared with Brother and the Seer. A home she could not imagine leaving, no matter the sad memory of leavetaking.

_Find the roots of an ancient tree_

Brother also mourns in the night, standing atop the roof of a small nesting-room at the edge of the city. He wonders what kept Sister on the planet where the Seer had died, why she has not come home with him. He is lonely here by himself, and the people do not understand.

He does not wonder about the Seer, certain he is better off released from his curse than he had ever been before. He can only hope that whatever the curse, it is not one that can be spread to any fledges he might have. He would not wish the life his brother had on anyone.

_Take me dancing, take me singing_

The Seer rests one clawed hand against the railing, watching the Doctor move around the console, taking the TARDIS someplace. The hum of the ship soothes him, the chaotic visions he's seen all his life fading as they hurtle through time and space.

He doesn't look at the small, crumpled form on the decking, though he knows that body is his own. It doesn't matter anymore. Just a physical shell, and he's going home. Home. A planet that doesn't exist, where millions died. A graveyard, but more home than either nest ever had been.

_I'll ride on until the moon meets the sea_

The Doctor stands at the console, watching the blip on the screen that was the body of the Seer as it drifts towards the star. The pain knotted between his hearts eases a little as he leaves a body to be consumed in the marker for the grave of a people. A body to bury, someone who saw the war when he should have been enjoying his childhood.

He curls his fingers around the edge of the cool metal a moment, a fleeting thought of where to go next crossing his mind, the Seer's words chasing it, an echo in his head.

 _Past is future is present is past._

The corners of his mouth curl up into a manic grin for a split-second before he starts fiddling with controls, the TARDIS dematerializing, and slipping back into the Vortex. The linear past might be a good place to start puzzling out this riddle.


End file.
